Skyrim's legacy crosses the decade mark with its new board game

To wrap up a ten-year run of Skyrim-related releases, Bethesda announced the existence of an official Skyrim board game last week called The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim - The Adventure Game.

Other than The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt, Skyrim was arguably what set the definitive standard for open-world fantasy role-playing games in the 2010s. Its paradigm-shifting, content-packed world still towers above many releases that came after it.

As a single-player game which has started to show its age and numerous cracks, Skyrim remained relevant for an absurdly long amount of time, partially thanks to its active modding community and multiple re-releases.

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Skyrim: The Adventure Game is Bethesda's second earnest effort in tabletop games

Skyrim is not Bethesda's first swing at making physical board games. Among the numerous spinoffs that the Fallout franchise has is Fallout: Wasteland Warfare. A board game made by Modiphius Entertainment, Bethesda shipped its first copies in Q3 2018, presumably in an attempt to piggyback on the pre-release hype of Fallout 76. While its high-quality resin game pieces found positive reviews, the game's pondrous rulebook did not help its prospects.

Skyrim: The Adventure Game is Bethesda's second collaborative attempt with Modiphius. The game's fundraiser page on Gamefound says:

"It will feature two campaigns set in the fourth era from the perspective of The Blades, acting as a prelude to Skyrim's events."

The second campaign, in fact, leads right up to the Dragonborn's capture at Skyrim's prologue. We also know it will be set in Skyrim's overworld and dungeons. Its backers on Gamefound can also get an early taste from a Tabletop Simulator demo provided by Modiphius.

In 2016, half a decade after its release, the game got its "Special Edition" release, which featured a facelift with an engine revamp, a survival mode, and a Bethesda-curated platform of new mods called Creation Club which had cross-platform access. This year, it will come full circle with Skyrim's Anniversary Edition.

As a single-player game to survive this long, Todd Howard's alleged knack for re-releasing Skyrim has become a long-running community meme. Beyond the Anniversary Edition, Bethesda continues to live up to this meme by "porting" the game to the tabletop.